by RJ Blain
“So you do know him then,” Derac murmured. The man had a thoughtful expression.
“Of course I know him. It is rare that someone who isn’t a Guardian leaves the Rift. The way is dangerous. I would hope I’d know the Guardians. They’re the elite among us Rifters,” Kalen replied.
“But you aren’t a Guardian.”
Kalen didn’t quite laugh, but made an acknowledging grunt. “Would’ve been.”
Or at least that was Arik’s excuse for dragging him out of bed before dawn each morning to spar.
Derac muttered in so low a tone Kalen almost didn’t hear it, “How egoistical.”
“It must be a pleasant thing to have a king who is born into the duty, as though the weight of his blood is enough to give him the heart and the skills to rule well.” Kalen didn’t mask his smile and hoped the man heard the venom in his words. Marist’s Yadesh turned her head to stare at him with one large, golden eye.
“Isn’t that how all kings are made?” Derac asked.
Settling for silence, Kalen shrugged and focused his attention on his horse’s ears.
“What are you talking about?” Marist asked. The road was just wide enough for the Knight’s Yadesh to fall in beside Kalen’s horse. The mare continued to watch him a bright eye.
“You’d be surprised what I understand. You’d be even more surprised at what I perceive,” Derac replied. “Let me ask you one last question.”
“What is it?”
“What is a Kelshite man doing on the Rift’s throne?”
Kalen twisted around on the saddle to stare at the man, forgetting he wasn’t on Ferethian, bootless, and that he wasn’t used to the broad girth of his horse. With a yelp, he tumbled over the side of the dappled gray and landed in the mud.
In his thoughts, Kalen heard the feminine laughter of the Yadesh. Her nose brushed against his neck before her teeth seized his collar and lifted him to his feet.
~~*~~
Mud coated Kalen like a second skin. The rain had stopped, as though punishing him for falling off of the horse. If the fall had injured him, the vellest masked the pain of it. He rode in silence and scowled whenever Derac glanced his way.
It must’ve been his eyes. People always doubted he was a Rifter whenever they saw his eyes. It wasn’t his fault they were the pale blue of the winter sky. If he’d been born with brown eyes, no one would’ve been the wiser.
But he had no way of denying the statement, not without the Yadesh knowing the truth of it. So, he remained silent and hoped his glare was perceived as a deep insult over the accusation of being born outside of the Rift.
Even if it was true.
“We’ll be in Harrold’s Crossing soon,” Marist said.
Garint slowed his Yadesh and they plodded along the road at a sedate walk. Kalen tensed, and his horse’s ears went back. The scent of smoke tickled his nose.
“Something wrong?” Derac asked.
“No,” Garint replied. The man’s Yadesh turned to block the road. “Everything is just as it should be.”
The First’s hatred roused and threatened to consume Kalen. ~Betrayed.~ The creature didn’t implant images in his thought, but revealed the pale auras of men hiding behind trees. The trees glowed with an aura as well, but it was dark and green and didn’t possess the fiery nimbus of the humans waiting to ambush them.
“What’s going on?” Derac demanded.
“Ambush,” Kalen muttered. His hand dropped to grab his sword before he remembered it wasn’t there. “Hellfires.”
“Take them,” Garint ordered in Danarite. The Knight drew his sword in one smooth motion. Instead of moving forward like Kalen expected, the man kicked his feet free of the stirrups and plunged the weapon into his mount’s side and across its foreleg. The Yadesh let out a pained squeal and fell. Garint jumped clear of the thrashing beast.
Kalen dove off of the horse’s back moments before the first twang of a bow broke the stunned silence. A horse screamed. Derac’s mount reared with a feathered shaft protruding from the side of its neck. The bright aura surrounding the animal flared red then faded to nothing.
The horse collapsed, convulsed, and fell still.
Another horse squealed before it was silenced. Without waiting to see if the ambushers would fire off another volley, Kalen ran for the cover of the trees. The forms of several men emerged from hiding. Instead of the tunic and trousers the Kelshites wore, the dark-skinned men wore robes that were torn off at the knee. Each one wore a different color that reminded him of the hues of the sunset. A stylized sunburst was emblazoned on their shoulder.
One reached for the hilt of a weapon protruding from his crimson robes. Kalen lunged forward and drove his shoulder into the man’s groin. The Danarite let out a strangled gasp. Curling his fingers around the dagger, Kalen jerked it free of the sheath and buried it into the man’s chest. With a jerk and a gurgled cry, the man fell.
“Take him, fools!” Garint bellowed from the road. The enraged scream of the Knight’s Yadesh answered the man’s command.
~Betrayed,~ the First whispered in Kalen’s thoughts. For the first time, no emotions or images accompanied the word.
Yanking the dagger free of the Danarite’s chest, Kalen twisted around to face the other men. He let out a startled yelp as two figures threw themselves at him. The robes of the slain man tangled around his feet and he fell. The weight of the first man hit him full in the chest and shoved him into the mud. Kalen twisted the dagger and tried to plunge it into his assailant. The dagger was ripped from Kalen’s grip and tossed aside. A hand seized his throat, cut off his breath, and held him in place. Dark skin clashed against the orange cloth the man wore. A thick black beard masked the figure’s mouth.
“Do what you want with the others,” Garint said in Danarite. The Knight stepped into view, blood dripping from his drawn sword. Garint’s boot caught Kalen in the ribs. In Kelshite the man said, “You’ve no idea how much I’ve been looking forward to this, Rift King. You would’ve done well to stay in your wretched little canyons. But, you’ve made me a very, very wealthy man indeed.”
“Betrayer,” Kalen rasped. He was rewarded with another kick to the ribs.
“Silence him,” Garint growled.
One of the Danarites tore a length from the dead man’s robes and shoved it in Kalen’s mouth. Someone snatched his hair and jerked him upright. The gag was tied into place. Kalen kept his breaths slow and even and fought to control the rapid beating of his heart. Even if he struggled, breaking free was unlikely at best.
He longed for the cliffs and its twisting trails, the terrain he knew. That was the land he could fight on equal footing, even against men bigger and stronger than he.
Kalen wished he could speak, if only to mutter curses at the forest, which had conspired against him. The Danarites dragged him through the trees and took no chances despite his cooperation. One held his arm behind his back and pinned his wrist halfway up his spine. The vellest numbed him to most of the pain, but his muscles strained in protest. Another kept a firm grip on the back of his neck. It wasn’t quite strong enough to cut off his breath, but it was close.
The road was strewn with the bodies of dead horses. The Yadesh lay among them, their coats stained with mud and blood. Marist lay beside his beast, one hand stretched out to her muzzle. Blood streaked across her nose where the young man’s fingers had managed to brush against her. She was still alive, barely.
The Knight’s eyes were open, but could no longer see.
Across the road, Derac struggled in the grip of two more robed Danarites. The other Kelshites were dead, their bodies left to rot where they’d fallen.
“What about their horse demons?” the Danarite behind Kalen asked.
“Leave them. They’ll die soon enough,” Garint replied. Ignoring the bodies of his fallen comrades, the man knelt beside the dead horses and started searching through the saddlebags. “Can’t curse you if they die when you aren’t there. Take their swords. It’s good steel.�
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Kalen’s brows furrowed. Horse demons? Curses?
Of the Kelshite group, only the Yadesh still lived. Did the Danarites really think of the animals as hellspawn from the Deeps? He’d seen some of the things living in the Deeps, and the Yadesh weren’t nearly as frightening.
A red-robed man stepped out from the trees and snapped his fingers. One of the younger Danarites, clad in pale yellow robes, hurried to obey. “So Soiris is dead. Who killed him?”
The grip on Kalen’s neck tightened. “This one did,” the man behind him replied.
“A child? A suitable sacrifice, I suppose. Soiris deserved his fate if he let such a youth slay him.”
Kalen narrowed his eyes. How had the Danarite known he had killed someone? It hadn’t been long since he’d been captured, and the red robes were bright enough color that the shadows couldn’t have hidden the color.
“He is the one you’ve sought, Lord Priest,” Garint replied.
A lump formed in Kalen’s throat and he couldn’t swallow it back. He knew about the existence of the Danarite Lord Priests and the things they could conjure, but little more than that. Was the red robe the mark of a Lord Priest? Had the man he’d stabbed been one as well?
“Him?” The Lord Priest laughed and crossed the road. The tips of the man’s fingers were cold against Kalen’s jaw. The Lord Priest twisted his head to the left and then to the right. Kalen made no sound. “This is a Rifter?”
“Not just a Rifter,” Garint said in a sniveling, honey-sweet tone. “He is their King. I’ve his sigil and his brooch, both bearing the Rift King’s mark on them. You wanted knowledge of the Rift King. I’ve delivered, Lord Priest. I’ve brought him to you.”
“What of your man? Why is he not here?”
Garint straightened at the change in subject. “Dead. He suffered from doubt and I didn’t dare compromise my mission.”
“I see. What other proof do you have that this mere child is the Rift King? The Rift King doesn’t leave his precious canyons, not for any reason. Do you expect me to believe this?” The Danarite released Kalen’s chin and lifted up one of the braids. The man’s red-gloved fingers stroked the three beads that were tied to the very end of it. “Silver, gold, and black.”
“The Rift King’s colors,” Garint said. “Just like the sigil and the brooch.”
“And why does the other man live?”
“Derac is a noble’s son, Lord Priest, and one of importance. If we kill him, they’ll have just cause. By ransoming him, it looks as if bandits were responsible. They won’t be the wiser for it until we’re long out of Kelsh. The others had no value.”
Derac ceased struggling, his eyes cold and hard.
“You’ve put some thought into this. Very well. I’ll consider your suggestion. We’re done here. Leave the bodies,” the Lord Priest ordered. At the snap of the man’s fingers, several tunic-clad Danarites emerged from the forest leading horses behind them.
Kalen was tossed across the withers of one of the larger beasts and tied there. The Danarites forced Derac to walk, but not even the crack of the whip on the man’s back extinguished the light of hatred smoldering in the Kelshite’s eyes.
~~*~~
The hilt of the jeweled dagger caught the fading daylight. The pommel stone cracked down on the back of Kalen’s hand. Bones cracked. His body jerked, and he swallowed back his scream. He forced himself to meet the Lord Priest’s gaze and smiled.
“Why have you come here?”
The Danarite favored that question, and Kalen once again remained silent. If they wanted to learn anything from him, they’d have to peel it from his cold corpse.
Lord Priest Helethor’s expression contorted from rage. “Answer me!”
The next blow landed on Kalen’s knuckle. Through the pain-born fog in his head, he was aware of the Lord Priest shouting and cursing.
Time lost meaning for him. He didn’t remember being hauled to his feet or being forced to walk. Kalen stumbled, and if it weren’t for the tight grip on his hair, he would’ve fallen. Each step woke the stabbing pain of broken bones. His breath rattled in his chest, and no matter how many times he swallowed, the taste of his own blood remained on his tongue.
No matter how hard he tried to lift his feet to take another step forward, his left foot flopped behind and his right foot didn’t fare much better.
He wasn’t certain if it was night or if he’d been blinded.
“You shouldn’t have defied me,” Lord Priest Helethor said in a low, even tone.
The vellest no longer eased his agony, but it kept him conscious and anchored him in the land of the living when he should’ve been dead. Kalen twisted his bloodied lips into a mocking grin.
A fist caught him in the gut and drove the air from his lungs. When he coughed, the heat of his blood flooded his mouth.
“He’ll die if you keep doing that,” Garint commented in an emotionless voice. “Without getting the answers you seek.”
“I know that,” Lord Priest Helethor snapped. “I’ll just extract the answers from his corpse after the sunset rituals. Fool won’t live that long.”
“As you wish,” Garint replied.
Kalen was dropped. He hit the ground hard. He struggled for breath, and choked on his blood. Of all the places to die, it was in Kelsh at the hands of a Danarite.
He wanted to laugh at the irony, but no sound emerged from his throat. In a way, he was almost relieved. His burden would pass on to someone else.
“I’ll leave you to prepare the body,” the Lord Priest said. Kalen strained to hear the man depart, but his ears didn’t work quite right. The sound of the Danarite’s voice was muffled.
Kalen closed his eyes, but he was denied rest.
“Any last wishes?” Garint asked. The man’s hand fell on Kalen’s shoulder and gripped it hard.
“Sword,” he managed to choke out.
“I can’t give you a sword.”
“No,” Kalen said and coughed. He spit blood. The breath he managed to draw was shallow, but it was enough to let him speak again. “Finish it. Deny him what he wants.”
Garint’s grip tightened. “Are you certain?”
Kalen tried to clench his hand into a fist, but his broken fingers refused to bend. “Can’t get the secrets of the Rift King if the corpse is not that of the Rift King. Take your sword and take my rank. You wanted power, didn’t you? Take it and guard the secret well.”
“What secret?”
Kalen couldn’t force any more words out. With his heartbeat faltering in his ears, he cursed the vellest and its refusal to relinquish its hold even when his body had long since been broken.
“They’ll be occupied with their rituals for the next hour. Heretics like me aren’t permitted, and they believe they’ve got me reined in. If I remove the gag, Derac, do you so swear to stay quiet?”
There was a long moment of silence. Then, “You killed your own Yadesh. You killed Marist,” Derac hissed out. “What are you doing?”
“I can’t tell you. I can give you a chance, and that is all. Do you understand? I had thought they would delay before killing him. I thought they wouldn’t go to such measures so quickly. I thought they’d keep him alive since they wanted him alive,” Garint replied. “So I give you an option. Escape, die trying, or die. Which do you choose?”
“I can’t trust you,” Derac said.
“I didn’t ask you to trust me. Don’t make the mistake of thinking I’m doing this because I like either one of you. I’m doing this because I hate them more than you. That’s all.”
“Then why side with them?”
“You weren’t the only one betrayed,” Garint said, and his voice was bitter.
“What do you mean?”
“Kelshite King,” Kalen rasped, and hoped they’d understand his meaning. Derac drew a sharp breath.
“You’re as cunning as rumor says, and I regret that we could not have met on better terms,” Garint said. “I can offer you this. I’m not much of a
healer. That man you call King doesn’t like when his Knights learn such things, but I might be able to at least slow your death. You can’t go to Harrold’s Crossing. By now, it’s surely fallen. Isn’t it ironic, Derac, that your very uncle has a villa to the west of here? He keeps a healer, and is a favored stop of the Knights on duty.”
“I know of it. But, why? Why change your mind now?”
Kalen didn’t need to see the man’s face to hear the tears in his voice.
“His Majesty commanded I aid them. That I serve them so that in turn, we could destroy them all. But they suspected. They knew, and I think it is because he told them. I swore even as I cut my own Yadesh down that I would ruin them all,” Garint whispered. “Decide.”
~Live,~ the First said, speaking for the first time since he’d been captured.
The command gave him the strength to speak. “We’ll go,” Kalen choked out. “Derac’s hand can finish it.”
The simple act of breathing shouldn’t have been so hard, but Kalen refused to be defeated. Not until his last duty was done.
A Rift King lived by the sword and died by the sword, and he refused to be any different.
“Stubborn to the very end. You’ve my word, and Derac has my sword,” Garint replied. “Are we in agreement, then? Do try to at least live through the night, Rift King. I’d hate to see my effort and my loss of Satrin completely wasted. The longer they chase after you, the more time it is before they chase after me.”
“You son of a whore,” Derac growled.
“I’ll take that to mean you’re in agreement. I don’t know how long this will keep him alive. You’ll need to hurry,” Garint said. “Derac, the horses are tied near the stream that way. Hareth’s horse is among them. Take what you can and be quick and quiet about it.”
“Stubborn fool,” Garint muttered. “If you’d only talked, I wouldn’t have had to do this.”
Kalen let out a short and low bark of laughter, but said nothing.
Garint’s hand on his chest was warm. Then, he felt nothing at all.